China marvels at mighty fighters

When Avengers: Infinity War premiered at midnight of May 10 last week, millions of Chinese fans flooded to cinemas, although most of them had to work on Friday. The first screenings brought in nearly 60 million yuan, just shy of the record-holder The Fate of the Furious, which grossed 62.7 million yuan.

For most industry watchers and critics, the success of this latest Avengers outing is greatly due to the decadelong development of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, arguably the most influential and lucrative movie franchise in the world, gathering together dozens of well-loved superheroes, which all started with Iron Man in 2008.

China's movie industry grossed merely 4.34 billion yuan that year but soared to 55.9 billion yuan in 2017. It was a period of high-speed growth occurring, coincidentally, at the same time as the MCU's expansion, giving it a perfect springboard to cultivate a large Chinese fanbase, compared with other blockbuster franchises, such as Star Wars, which began in late 1970s.

For some, however, the franchise may have evolved a bit too far and become too "fan-oriented."

In a Douban review marked as "useful" by more than 8,000 netizens, film fan Ling Rui writes that audiences who did not watch the several previous Marvel films would feel confused about the plot of Infinity War.